Rudy Farias case takes disturbing turn with allegations against mother (2024)

The case of a Texas man found last week after being reported missing in 2015 has taken a disturbing turn—with allegations that he was actually held captive and abused by his mother for those eight years.

Rudolph "Rudy" Farias IV was 17 when he disappeared after taking his two dogs for a walk near his family's home in northeast Houston on March 6, 2015.

Police said Farias, now 25, was found on Thursday, June 29, after they received a call about a person lying on the ground in front of a church in Houston.

It was not immediately clear where Farias had been for the past eight years.

"What we do know is at the time of his recovery, a good Samaritan located him unresponsive and immediately called police," Farias' mother Janie Santana said in a statement.

"My son Rudy is receiving the care he needs to overcome his trauma but, at this time, he is nonverbal and not able to communicate with us."

However, Santana's neighbors in Houston told reporters earlier this week that Farias was never missing and they had seen him frequently over the years.

Now Quanell X, a community activist who was present when detectives spoke to Farias on Wednesday, said the 25-year-old told them he had been living with his mother.

Quanell X told reporters that Santana had invited him to come to a hotel in Humble where she and her son were meeting with investigators.

The activist said that when Santana was not present, Farias alleged that he had been drugged and sexually abused by his mother for years.

Santana has not been arrested or charged with any offense. Newsweek has sought to contact her for comment through the Texas Center for the Missing, which was handling public communications on behalf of the family.

Newsweek has also contacted Quanell X and the Houston Police Department for comment.

On Wednesday Santana told Fox 26 in an off-camera interview that her son had been kidnapped in 2015 and taken to Mexico with a bag over his head, and that he had walked back to Houston.

But according to Quanell X, Farias told investigators he had run away in 2015 because he was tired of his mother not respecting his personal boundaries and of "living like a slave."

When he came back two days later, Santana allegedly told him to hide because he would get in trouble with the police for running away.

"I heard horrific things from that young man," Quanell X said. "No child should ever be treated like that by your own mother."

He added: "He said that she would make him sleep in the bed with her and he said that she made him 'play daddy.' He said that he didn't like getting in the bed with her. That he would try to sneak out of the bed and sometimes hide under the bed, but she told him he had to be her husband."

Farias said he was forced to sleep in the bed with no clothes on and alleged that he was given drugs, according to Quanell X.

"That young man's body have scars all over it... all type of scars on this kid and he said that she often locked him in the room, that she would give him drugs and lock him in the room," he said.

Farias told the detectives that he sometimes went to work with his mother and visited neighbors under an assumed name, Quanell X said.

"She believed that after so many years, people have forgotten about the case and that under an assumed name—and convinced him to use that name—nobody would put two and two together," the activist said.

Earlier this week, Santana's neighbors said they knew the young man who visited them as Dolph, rather than Rudy.

The reason Farias was found outside the church last week, Quanell X said, was because he had stolen his mother's car to escape but ended up crashing it.

Some family members told local news outlets they were shocked by the allegations.

Sylvia Lopez, one of Farias' aunts, told KHOU 11 that she had not seen him since the day he was reported missing and had even traveled out of state with Santana to search for him.

"She had me out there in California thinking that they had found somebody that looked like Rudy in California," Lopez said. "And I went all the way with her."

KPRC 2 reporter Corley Peel shared a video taken by neighbors of a conversation they had with Santana. "Now they want to arrest me because they said I was hiding him," Santana said in the clip.

Houston Police posted a statement on Twitter on Wednesday saying detectives had spoken with Farias and his mother, but "are not in a position at this time to discuss specifics of the interviews or if the content being released is entirely factual."

A news conference will be held at some point on Thursday, police added.